


A Field Outside Smallville

by y02mustang



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Gen, cousin dynamics, i have a lot of feels about kara's arrival okay, kelex, minor references to the danvers, or possibly just pre-canon, possibly canon divergent?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 14:39:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11671104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/y02mustang/pseuds/y02mustang
Summary: A short fic about before and shortly after Kara arrived on Earth. First chapter is Kal-El’s perspective, second chapter is Kara’s.I don’t know if this is really canon divergent since we don’t know much about the pre-Kara Supergirl universe, but it doesn’t exactly follow the Smallville timeline.





	1. Kal-El

“What… Kelex, what do you mean? There was another pod?”

“Master Kal, the information in your pod indicates that your cousin, Kara Zor-El, was to follow you to Earth. Her pod would have been interlocked with the same coordinates as your own.”

Clark stared at the robot. “But… where is she? There was no other ship, the Kents would have told me. Kelex, can you scan for the signature from her ship?”

“Yes, Master Kal. I can trace the flightpath of your pod.”

“Do it.”

“It will take some time.”

Clark clenched his hands into fists and stared up into the crystalline faces of his birth parents. He had no memory of them but they were family, and so was this Kara. Another survivor from Krypton’s destruction. He wasn’t the last. 

“Find her.” 

“Scanning.”

Clark stormed out of the Fortress and took to the skies. 

*****

He landed in a field outside of Smallville and walked a few paces, cape folding as he crouched down, placing his hand against the earth, against the dirt where, twenty-two years earlier, his pod had crash-landed. His first taste of Earth had come right here, when Jon pried the front shield from the pod. His human strength normally wouldn’t have been able to remove any piece of the ship, but the rough landing, bouncing off at least one mountain, had cracked the metal near the hinges of the canopy.

Jon liked to tell the story of how Clark had blinked up at him, twice, and then simply started screaming. Jon reached into the ship, moving slowly in case there was some sort of defense mechanism, and collected Clark into his arms, baby blanket and all. If the pod from outer space hadn’t been a large enough clue, the strange material of the blanket and clothes he was wearing would have given his alien heritage away. 

Jon walked slowly back to the truck where Martha waited, calling her husband’s name, and he just cooed to the baby, trying to soothe him. He had no idea that the nine-month-old was overwhelmed by radiation from the yellow sun and the child had no idea what to make of the feeling permeating every cell in his little body.

Clark grabbed a handful of the dirt and let it run through his fingers. 

There were times growing up that he knew something was off, as his powers began to develop, and he knew it had been hard on the Kents. He had strength within a few days, Martha recalled, and at fourteen months, when he should have been beginning to feed himself with utensils, Martha had kept him on finger foods (which ended up being mostly smashed fruits and crumbs of anything else that he shoved into his mouth) and kept him distracted when trying to feed him with a spoon so he wouldn’t bite down and try to chew the utensil. It took him until two years old to be able to hold a spoon without crushing it.

Jeremiah and Eliza had been a godsend, a phrase Martha repeated anytime Clark asked questions about his upbringing. The Kents couldn’t take him to a regular doctor, obviously, so Jon had carefully reached out to his friend Jeremiah in California and after a few vaguely “hypothetical” questions, brought the Danvers into their secret. Within a month, Jeremiah created a few baby toys that would withstand an alien toddler and the Kents offered the toys extensively anytime they interacted with Clark in order to redirect him from accidentally breaking human bones. 

He winced. Apparently he’d broken Jon’s fingers the first time he grabbed them. 

When the x-ray vision and super hearing became apparent, it was Jeremiah to the rescue, again, with a pair of lead-lined glasses to dampen the input. Well, several pairs, because teenage alien boys are just as forgetful and careless as other children their age, but the fifth pair had been the charm and was the set that Clark still wore when he was in his human persona. 

Recalling the sensory overload that he suffered those few days while Jeremiah and Eliza tried to work out options, before they came up with the glasses, he exhaled slowly, feeling a little sick at the memory. 

He’d had to manage all of this without any help from a Kryptonian, without having any idea what was going on with his body. 

He wanted better for Kara. He’d take care of her when she landed. He’d find her, he’d watch out for her, he’d help her as she gained her powers. Super speed and flying had been fun - they could enjoy that together. 

He imagined them bursting through clouds together and smiled. 

He had a cousin.

He had family. 

*****

Clark returned to the Fortress a few weeks later. 

“Kelex, any update?”

“Still searching, Master Kal. No sign of the other pod.”

He sighed. “Keep looking.” 

He studied the letters on the main panel in front of him, hesitantly choosing a few letters, pulling up his family tree. He wanted to learn more about his cousin. 

Daughter of Alura In-Ze and Zor El. Zor El was a scientist, like his brother, Jor El, and Alura was also a scientist, but she focused more on botany. 

Clark tried to pronounce a few of the names of the plants but moved on quickly. Kryptonian was still difficult, though he’d been trying to learn for the past several months. Maybe he and Kara could speak it together. 

The records indicated she was just shy of her thirteenth birthday when Krypton exploded. He put his hands on his hips and considered that. She’d actually remember Krypton, she’d speak Kryptonian fluently… and she was probably expecting him to be a baby. Alura and Zor El probably sent her along to care for him on this new planet. 

Well. He’d just have to take care of her instead. 

*****

Clark continued checking on Kelex’s progress but when it became clear that it was indeed going to take a while, his returns to the Fortress became less frequent. 

Forty-seven weeks after he’d first made the request, Clark landed in the Fortress and strode into the main chamber. It had been almost four months since his last visit and he sighed as he asked Kelex for an update, expecting the same “Still searching, Master Kal” he’d heard every time before. 

“I have located Kara Zor-El’s pod, Master Kal.”

“Where?! What happened to her?”

“It appears the shock wave from Krypton’s destruction knocked her pod off course. There is a faint trail that indicates her ship has been lost in the Phantom Zone.”

“... what is that?”

“An area of space in which time does not pass.”

Clark felt the breath leave his lungs for a moment and he rocked back on his heels. “How do we get her out of there?”

“I am not aware of any manner in which to extract anything from the Phantom Zone, Master Kal.”

He growled. “Find one. We have to do something. Search the databases.”

“Yes, Master Kal. It may take some time.”

“It doesn’t matter. We can’t leave her there.”

He let out a slow breath and slammed his hand on the control panel, bringing up the entry on the Phantom Zone. There had to be something they could do.

*****

Seven months later, Kelex reported, “Master Kal, there is a development on Kara Zor-El’s pod.”

“What is it?”

“There is a new reading. The ship is exiting the Phantom Zone.”

“How? I thought you couldn’t pull it free.”

“I cannot, Master Kal. I do not know the source of the movement, but the pod’s engines are online and the ship is resuming its trajectory to Earth.”

Clark swallowed. “She’s on her way?”

“Yes.”

“How long until she arrives?”

“Approximately twenty-seven days, eighteen hours, and fifty-three minutes.”

He nodded. “Okay, that’s good. That’s great. I… I need to get ready.”

*****

When Clark landed outside his childhood home, quickly changing into Clark Kent’s normal wear of jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, grinning and wanting to tell his parents that they’d finally managed to find his cousin, Martha met him out front. That she’d been crying was obvious and Clark’s smile fell at the rapid beat of her heart.

“Mom?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

She shook her head and he wrapped his arms around her, looking up at the house. She took a shuddering breath and just buried her face into his chest. He frowned and cast his hearing out around the farm. Besides Martha’s, the only other heartbeats he found were Shelby’s and other animals.

“... where’s Dad?”

She cried harder and it was only when he focused his hearing on her directly that he heard the whisper that he was gone. 

*****

Clark reached out to the Danvers two weeks later. They’d attended Jonathan’s funeral and offered Martha and Clark sincere condolences and warm hugs but Clark hadn’t wanted to approach them about his Earth-bound cousin. It was only a week later when he realized that he was in no position to care for a twelve-year-old, blood or not, and that it was better that she grow up with a normal human childhood, like he did. Better than a struggling junior reporter living on his own in a small apartment in Metropolis. 

He missed Jonathan and he wanted her to have a shot at knowing an Earth dad, too. Martha insisted she’d be able to help but Clark didn’t want to put that stress on her. She wasn’t sleeping and tried to hide it and he just couldn’t drop a Kryptonian pre-teen in her lap. 

Eliza responded quickly, assuring him that they would be glad to help, that Kara would grow up safe and loved and they would help her understand her powers, that he would always be welcome to visit and give her that important family connection. 

Clark thanked them and began planning for the day his cousin would land. 

*****  
It was mid-day and Clark found himself back at the spot where his pod had landed nearly twenty-four years earlier. The sun was high and he soaked up the radiation, wiping his hands on his cape idly, more nervous than he expected he would be. 

He picked up the sound of the pod as it began to enter the atmosphere, the rumble and hiss as it broke into the stratosphere and, finally, the troposphere. It was just a minute longer before it came into view, rocketing through the sky, bouncing off the same mountain Clark imagined he’d ricocheted off as well, diving toward the ground. It rocked and skid to a stop some two hundred meters away. 

Clark took a single leap and landed near the pod, grasping the shield and ripping it away, revealing the young girl within.


	2. Kara Zor-El

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And now we see Kara.

Kara braced her arms and legs against the interior of the pod as the ship landed, cushioning the violent turbulence as it crashed to the ground. She only had a moment to breathe and begin to examine her surroundings when the top of her pod was violently removed and she gasped. Was she under attack? 

The sun was bright and, was it the sun though? It was yellow, yes, that’s right, her mother explained Earth had a yellow sun. The first difference from Krypton.

She blinked and squinted. Someone was reaching a hand out, so this didn’t seem like an attack. Then her eyes widened. 

The House of El. This man wore the emblem of her family on his chest. 

“Who are you?” she asked, moving her eyes slowly over the form of the tall man in front of her. This couldn’t be her cousin - had someone else survived Krypton and also come to Earth? “Why do you wear my family’s crest?”

“I am Kal-El,” he said, “you’re safe, Kara.” 

She frowned. His accent was terrible, honestly, and the words were broken in his mouth. She could understand him but he’d never make high marks in school with his pronunciation. If this was Kal-El, Krypton was no longer his native language. He had not been brought up speaking Kryptonian. She swallowed hard. She would have to teach him of his home planet, the history of his people, the glory of his House. 

“My cousin is a child. You can’t be Kal-El.” She shoved his hand away and stood up, reaching back to grab the edge of the pod when everything suddenly invaded her senses. Suddenly she could hear _everything_ \- the blades of grass brushing against the man’s red boots, the creak of the pod as her feet shifted, the wind in the trees some distance away, a rock scraping down the side of the mountain she’d probably crashed into, the heartbeat of the man before her, the heartbeat of an _entire town, there were hundreds of people, she could hear their voices, screeching alarms of some sort, animals making all manner of noises, what was this --_

“Kara, breathe. _Urvish_.” His hand reached for her again. “Close your eyes. I won’t hurt you. The yellow sun gives us powers. Focus. You can tune it out. Listen to my voice.”

She closed her eyes, she had no choice, and she slammed her hands over her ears. 

She felt arms around her and then she was being carried. She moved one hand to press her ear against his chest, focusing on his breathing, the expansion and collapse of his lungs, his heartbeat, the blood moving in his veins, and sighed after a long moment. 

“Okay?” he asked, his voice a deep rumble.

“Yes. Thank you. Who are you?”

“I am Kal-El, son of Lara and Jor-El.”

“How is that possible? I was… I was sent here for you.”

He sighed and shifted her in his hold. “I know… your ship got caught in a place where time doesn’t pass. It’s been twenty-four years on Earth since Krypton exploded.”

She winced at the phrase, remembering vividly the day her planet died. It wasn’t just a planet, barren, that was perhaps hit by a meteor and exploded, sending pieces of crust and core to the expanses of space. This was a planet with a population in the billions, with a history, with a culture, with species of animals that had become extinct in a flash. Krypton didn’t _explode_ , it _died_ , and she would carry that memory and feel that distinction for the rest of her life. 

“Rao, twenty-four years.” She put her hand against the symbol on his chest. “Do the people know of our House? What is it like here?”

Kal sighed. “The people here, humans, they look like us, but they have no powers here. The yellow sun gives us many powers, including great strength, and we must control ourselves or we can easily hurt the humans.” He glanced down at her. “And the super hearing, as you just experienced, can be overwhelming at first. I have some friends that can help you, like they helped me when I was growing up.”

Kara nodded. “So the people are kind here.”

He hesitated. “Many are. There are some that are not. There are some that are afraid of me. Of us. Because of our abilities. So it’s important that we keep our powers a secret.”

“Yet you wear the crest of the House of El proudly.”

“I… yes. I wear it when I take on the identity of Superman, a hero of Earth. That is the only time I can use my powers freely. I have another identity that I adopt to blend in with the humans.”

She shifted. “You can set me down now.” He did so, and then she slipped her hand in his, glancing up at him for a moment. He was handsome, she saw now, getting a good look at his dark hair and dark blue eyes, and oh, he was grown. She remembered rocking him to sleep at night, brushing that dark hair out of his eyes when it was just a crop of soft baby hair, comforting him when he got a fever and Aunt Lara needed a break, and she wanted that feeling back. That feeling of family, of knowing her place in the world. 

She felt tears well and wiped at her eyes with her free hand. Her parents sent her to take care of Kal-El and he didn’t need her anymore. He’d grown without her. She’d been entirely unable to help him adapt to this new planet. She should be the one explaining powers and humanity and the culture of this place. 

She took a deep breath. “Who are you when you are acting like a human?”

He rolled his shoulders a little. “My name is Clark Kent. Kent is the name of the family that adopted me. They found me in my pod when I landed.”

“And they were good to you?” This was important. Kara couldn’t be there for Kal-El, she needed to know that the family he forged on this planet was loving, attentive, caring, everything that he would have had on Krypton. 

“Very. They raised me as best they could, which was difficult as my abilities began to manifest.”

“Good,” she breathed. “So, I will be Kara Kent when I pretend to be human?” His heartbeat slammed against his chest for a moment and she felt it all the way down to his fingertips. She frowned. “What is it?”

“You’ll be Kara Danvers. The Danvers are very good friends of mine, they will take good care of you, and they know all about our powers, so they can help you adapt to Earth.”

“You’re not… I’m not living with you?”

He shook his head. “The Danvers are good people, Kara. They’re going to love you.”

_But don’t you love me? We are blood, Kal. We should be together. We should have been together from the start and I am sorry that I missed your childhood, I missed watching you grow into the man you are today, but… are we not still family?_

“As you wish,” she said at last. Her mother had told her to watch over her baby cousin, but that was a mission she’d failed outright. Her mother’s wish had been for her to do extraordinary things and _that_ she would do, but she had to trust Kal-El to lead her on this planet, to set her on the right path. 

So she would not fight his decision, though she didn’t understand it. 

“When will I meet the Danvers?” The name was strange on her tongue. 

“We’ll need to fly there. Can I carry you again? It will take a little while under the sun’s rays before you gain all of your powers here.”

She nodded and he scooped her up again, crouching slightly and then pushing off, launching them into the sky. 

He flew quicker than he normally did with a human in his arms, knowing her Kryptonian structure could handle similar speeds, though he still restrained himself from going his full speed, until Kara absorbed enough of the yellow sun. If it was just enough speed where conversation was difficult, well, that was just how it happened. 

They landed on the outskirts of a property with a two-story house. Kal set her on her feet and a few moments later, the front door of the house opened and a man and a woman hurried out. They waited patiently for Kal and Kara to approach.

Kara took Kal’s hand again and squeezed, and he spoke gently, “That’s far too rough for a human, so you know. We can embrace each other with as much force as we’d like, but a careless touch from us can and will break their bones.” She looked down at her feet. “It’s okay. The Danvers will help you.”

“Will you help me?”

He swallowed. “Sure. Of course.” They neared the couple and he knelt before her for a moment. “I’m glad you’re here, Kara. We’re family, right? We stick together. I’ll be in touch with you so much you’ll get sick of me. But I’m going to give you time to get acclimated first, let you settle in, okay?”

She nodded. He knew best. After all, he’d done all this before. 

He stood again and walked her up to the Danvers. “This is Kara, my cousin,” he said, but he’d changed to another language, probably whatever language the Danvers spoke. Was there a singular language across the planet? She understood her name, but wasn’t sure what else was said. “Thank you for taking her in.”

The woman smiled and softly put her hands on Kara’s shoulders. “I know I’m not your mom, sweetheart, but you’re safe here.”

Kara could tell the woman was touching her but she could barely feel it and she had no idea what she was saying, but it was clear she was trying to be kind. Kal translated her words and Kara smiled politely. 

He cocked his head at something Kara couldn’t hear, didn’t want to hear, didn’t want to open herself up to trying to listen to anything beyond a small radius around her, and then he was tossing a _“Ehrosh m'bem”_ over his shoulder and taking off into the sky without her. 

Kara sighed and resigned herself to living in a house where no one spoke her language, where no one knew her music, her jokes, the names of friends and family. Kal-El had been a baby when he landed, he’d been raised on Earth and this planet was all he knew, but she remembered Krypton like it was yesterday. There were no crystals here, no hovercrafts, no towering structures, because her people, her family, were gone, because she’d watched Krypton die. She wanted nothing more than to see them again but that was impossible. 

She took a slow breath and blinked at the couple in front of her. They were smiling gently. She guessed from their body language that they were paired together, perhaps married. The woman had blonde hair, where her mother’s hair had been dark, and the man had a scruff of beard where her father had been clean-shaven, and movement in a window at the second-story revealed a young girl - she had a sister now, a sibling she’d always wanted on Krypton, but no, she couldn’t compare them. There was no comparison. 

But the Danvers seemed kind and welcoming, and Kal indicated this was where she needed to be, and her mother said she would do extraordinary things, and she would make a family here like Kal did. She gripped her mother’s necklace, the edge of her fist resting against the ridges of the symbol of her House, and she closed her eyes for a moment, grieving for all Kara Zor-El had lost. 

Kara Danvers opened her eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been doing way too much research on kryptonian.info and reading the book "Krypton". I tried to be as authentic as possible. 
> 
> Urvish means "calm", one of the 11 Kryptonian virtues known as "the Girod". It's a noun, rather than a verb, but given the connection to the virtues, I figure it might have more meaning to Kara.
> 
> In _Supergirl_ , Kal says "Khao shuh", which is supposed to be something like "to be continued", sort of a "until we meet again"; though it does not translate to anything that I can find precisely. I think this should have been more like "ehrosh m'bem", which means "good journey/life" and is used as a greeting, which is why I chose that phrase here.

**Author's Note:**

> After all the upset floating around today (SDCC 2017 fallout), I dove into fanfic and took this from a three paragraph idea to the 10 pages it is (finished) in a few hours.
> 
> Apparently anger is motivating?
> 
> There may be slight edits in the future, this hasn't been beta'd. Hope you enjoyed my foray into Kara's arrival on Earth.


End file.
